RAFAEL MONEO. Theory through practice.
Archive materials (1961-2016)
4 April to 11 June 2017
Curator: Francisco González de Canales
After its showing at various international venues, from 4 April to 11 June this year the Museo ThyssenBornemisza is presenting Rafael Moneo. Theory through practice. Archive materials (1961-2016), the first
major retrospective on this Spanish architect. Curated by Francisco González de Canales, professor at
the Universidad de Sevilla and at the AA in London, the exhibition, co-produced by the Fundación
Barrié, Estudio Rafael Moneo and the Museo Thyssen, brings together a selection of 121 drawings, 19
architectural models and 152 photographs associated with a total of 52 celebrated projects by Rafael
Moneo. In addition, to coincide with the Museo Thyssen’s 25th Anniversary, the exhibition is
accompanied by another smaller one curated by the architect José Manuel Barbeito on the history of
the Palacio Villahermosa from the mid-18th century to its remodelling in 1992 to house the Museum.
Rafael Moneo. Theory through practice. Archive materials (1961-2016) narrates the professional career of
an architect who has sought to define an approach to architectural projects founded on a stable
disciplinary base during a period of changing conditions, adopting the difficult position of defending
architecture as culture and as a specific form of knowledge. This narrative not only offers visitors a
presentation of Moneo’s own work but also reflects on an important part of the history of recent
architecture through his gaze. Ranging from organic and structuralist tendencies (1950-1960) to
Italian discourses on the city (1960-1970), the theoretical focus of East Coast American architects
(1970-1980) and the creation of the global star system in the 1990s, the exhibition’s six biographical
sections show how Moneo has resisted, reflected on and assimilated these different approaches of his
time to construct his own cultural reflection.
Images, from left to right: Portrait of Rafael Moneo. On the building site of
the laboratories of Columbia University in the City of New York
© Rafael Moneo. Courtesy Fundación Barrié / Museo Nacional
de Arte Romano de Mérida © Michael Moran/OTTO / Kursaal,
Auditorium and Conference Center, San Sebastián © Michael Moran/OTTO
More information and images:
Museo Thyssen-Bornemisza – Press Office:
Paseo del Prado, 8. 28014 Madrid. Tel. +34 914203944/+34 913600236.
Fax +34 914202780 [email protected];
http://www.museothyssen.org/microsites/prensa/2017/Moneo/index.html
The exhibition presents a series of important projects that span Rafael Moneo’s entire career and focus
on issues such as what an architect’s work can offer the society of his/her day and what type of
knowledge is involved. The selection of materials places particular emphasis on the importance of
drawing as a tool to develop his work and a means to define his thinking. The drawings on display
are accompanied by architectural models and photographs that help to illustrate the chosen works.
THE FORMATIVE YEARS: The School of Madrid (to
1968)
As a young architect, Rafael Moneo employed the
organic approach characteristic of the School of Madrid,
a type of functionalist architecture that looked for new
expressive forms. This trend is evident in his competition
proposal for the Madrid Opera House (1964), the Diestre
Transformers Factory (1964-1967), the Gómez-Acebo
Free-hand design. Madrid Opera House,
residence (1966-1968) and the Escuelas in Tudela (1966Spain, 1962. Pencil on paper © Rafael Moneo.
1971). Particularly notable from this period is the project
Courtesy Fundación Barrié
for the redesign of the Plaza del Obradoiro (1962) in
which the delicate articulation of the elements in relation to the setting reveal Moneo’s precocious
sensitivity to the urban context.
INDIVIDUAL EXPRESSION: The early mature period (to 1976)
In Moneo’s project that earned him the chair of
Compositional Elements at the School of Architecture
in Barcelona (1970), he located history at the centre of
his approach to architecture, considering it a body of
knowledge that provides architects with a series of
solutions already tried out by others. This new manner
of working also implied a questioning of the formal
coherence of the School of Madrid and a rethinking of
composition as a tool for articulating an architecture
constructed from different elements. In his projects for
Bankinter (1972-1976) and Logroño Town Hall (1973Headquarters of Bankinter ©Michael Morán/OTTO
1981) the compositional freedom of each of the parts
of the building allows for the inclusion of fragments of already designed buildings alongside the
requirements of the specific project and the particular characteristics of the context, all without
diminishing the integrity of the whole as another element within the fabric of the city.
THE INTERNATIONAL SCENE: Between Madrid and New York (to 1984)
In 1976 Moneo accepted an invitation to teach at the Cooper Union and a year later at Princeton. In
late 1970 architectural debate on the American East Coast was defined by its emphasis on theory and
graphic experimentation, with built work considered of lesser interest. While Moneo always rejected
the separation of theory from construction, these early contacts and his access to a broader debate
allowed him to shed some of the prejudices of the less open community from which he originated.
Dating from this period is his project for the extension of the Banco de España in Madrid (1978-1980),
for which he opted to retain and continue the academicist idiom of the pre-existing building, and the
Museo Nacional de Arte Romano in Mérida (1980-1986), where Moneo’s style reaches its highest
degree of formal complexity.
THE AMERICAN EXPERIENCE: Harvard (to 1990)
In 1985 Rafael Moneo was appointed director of the
department of architecture at Harvard and moved to
live in Cambridge, Massachusetts, for five years. This
experience not only implied a renewed awareness of
the necessary relationship between architectural
thought and construction, inherited from his training
within the context of the School of Madrid, but also a
new way of seeing the city and its scale. From the mid1980s onwards his buildings liberated themselves
from the dictates of urban morphology and opted for
Fundación Pilar i Joan Miró, Palma de Mallorca, 1987-1992.
more robust scales, evident in his designs for Atocha Drawing on paper. © Rafael Moneo. Courtesy Fundación Barrié
(1984-1992) and L’Illa Diagonal in Barcelona (19871994). As a result, they became geographical features, such as the Kursaal in San Sebastián (19901999) or even negations of the surrounding urban context, such as the Fundación Joan y Pilar Miró in
Palma de Mallorca (1987-1992) and l’Auditori in Barcelona (1987-1999).
A GLOBAL PROFESSIONAL PRACTICE: Return to Madrid and international recognition (to 1999)
Due to the requirements of his commissions in
Spain, in 1990 Moneo terminated his period at
Harvard. These years marked the start of his
international recognition and he was the subject
of numerous awards and honours, including the
Pritzker Prize in 1996. However, the more he
moved within this global context, the more his
discourse shifted towards the importance of the
specific place. For Moneo, the location does not
dictate a direct response towards the building
but has to be interpreted, reciprocally
Extension to the Museo del Prado, Madrid, 1998-2007.
constructed or on occasions even confronted.
Photographer Michael Moran © Rafael Moneo. Courtesy
Projects such as the Museum of Modern Art and
Fundación Barrié
Architecture in Stockholm (1991-1998), the
Audrey Jones Beck Building of the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston (1992-2000), the Cathedral of Our
Lady of the Angels in Los Angeles (1996-2002), and the extension to the Museo del Prado (1998-2007)
are profoundly imbued with that spirit, which emerges from the particular characteristics of the place.
THE STUDIO AT THE TURN OF THE CENTURY: A reflexive, professional practice (ongoing)
The 21st century began with further
recognition of Rafael Moneo’s career,
including the award of the RIBA gold medal
(2003) and the Prince of Asturias Prize for the
Arts (2012). During this period the architect
was responsible for buildings such as the LISE
for Harvard University (2000-2007) and the
laboratory building at Columbia University
(2005-2010), in which he aimed to show how
the contradictions between a commission
and the reality of its construction are not an
impediment to the project but rather provide
the
principal
opportunities
for
the
development of the architecture.
Cathedral of Our Lady of the Angels, Los Angeles, California,
USA, 1996-2002. Wood © Rafael Moneo, Courtesy Fundación
Barrié.
FROM THE PALACE VILLAHERMOSA TO THE
MUSEO THYSSEN-BORNEMISZA. THE HISTORY OF A BUILDING
This small exhibition, displayed in the Balcony
Gallery on the Museum’s first floor, looks at the
history of the Palacio Villahermosa through prints,
drawings, plans and photographs dating from the
mid-18th century to the building’s remodelling in
1992 to house the Museo Thyssen-Bornemisza.
The origins of the building date back to the mid-18th
century when Diego de Silva, Count of Galve,
acquired the town palace on the corner of the
Carrera de San Jerónimo and the Paseo del Prado. In
1746 the Duchess of Atri purchased the adjoining
Antonio López Aguado. Town palace of the
Duchess of Villahermosa. Garden façade, 1805.
land and building and commissioned the Italian
City Council of Madrid. Museo de Historia
architects working for the court, led by Vigilio
Rabaglio, to design a two-storey Rococo palace.
After the acquisition of the building in the late 18th century by the Duke and Duchess of Villahermosa,
Juan Pablo Azlor-Aragón and María Manuela Pignatelli, the palace underwent various enlargements
and alterations, acquiring a third floor and the restrained Neo-classical appearance that it still retains
today.
The Palacio Villahermosa remained in the possession of the dukes of Villahermosa during the 19th and
much of the 20th centuries. However, María Manuela’s son, José Antonio, 13th Duke of Villahermosa,
soon found himself obliged to rent out some of its principal rooms. This was the case, for example, in
1844 when Franz Liszt gave two concerts in what was at that point the Liceo Literario y Artístico de
Madrid, which was housed in the palace.
Divided in the end between the various heirs, from 1956 the Palacio Villahermosa housed a branch of
the Banco Transatlántico on its ground floor. In 1972 the building was acquired by the López-Quesada
Bank which commissioned Fernando Moreno Barberá to design its head office to be located in the
building, thus demolishing much of the interior. As the exhibition reveals, this was followed by Rafael
Moneo’s project to transform the building into a museum to house the Thyssen-Bornemisza
collection, respecting its origins as a city palace.
Rafael Moneo. Biography
José Rafael Moneo Vallés was born in Tudela (Navarre) in 1937. He studied architecture at the Escuela
Técnica Superior de Arquitectura in Madrid, obtaining his degree in 1961. While still a student he
worked with Francisco Javier Sáenz de Oiza. After a year in Jørn Utzon’s studio, in 1963 he obtained a
grant from the Academia de España in Rome, studying there until 1965. Moneo has taught at the
official schools of architecture in Madrid and Barcelona and was chairman of the Graduate School of
Design at Harvard between 1985 and 1990 where he is now Josep Lluis Sert Fellow.
In addition to his teaching activities, Rafael Moneo is active as a lecturer and critic, with articles
published in numerous international journals. In 2004 he published Ansiedad Teórica y Estrategia
Proyectural en Ocho Arquitectos Contemporáneos, and in 2010 Apuntes sobre 21 Obras. Notable among
his built works are the Museo Nacional de Arte Romano in Mérida (1985), L’Illa Diagonal in Barcelona
(1993), the Fundación Pilar y Joan Miró in Palma de Mallorca (1993), the Museum of Modern Art and
Architecture in Stockholm (1998), the Kursaal Auditorium and Conference Center in San Sebastián
(1999), the extension to the Town Hall of Murcia (1999), the Cathedral of Our Lady of the Angels in Los
Angeles (2002), and the extension to the Museo del Prado (2007). Moneo has received numerous
prizes and honours, including the Pritzker Prize for Architecture in 1996, the Gold Medal of the Royal
Institute of British Architects in 2003, and the Prince of Asturias Prize for the Arts in 2012.
EXHIBITION INFORMATION:
Title: RAFAEL MONEO. Theory through practice. Archive materials (1961-2016)
Organisers: the Fundación Barrié, Estudio Rafael Moneo and the Museo Thyssen-Bornemisza
Venue and dates: Madrid, Museo Thyssen-Bornemisza, 4 April to 11 June 2017
Curator: Francisco González de Canales, professor at the Universidad de Sevilla and at the AA in
London
Coordination and design: María Fraile
Number of work: 19 architectural models, 121 drawings and 152 photographs
Publications: Catalogue with texts by Francisco González de Canales and Rafael Moneo. Digital
publication on the Thyssen Kiosk app.
FROM THE PALACIO VILLAHERMOSA TO THE MUSEO THYSSEN-BORNEMISZA. THE HISTORY OF
A BUILDING:
Curator: José Manuel Barbeito, titular professor at the Escuela Superior de Arquitectura, Universidad
Politécnica, Madrid
Number of works: 1 architectural model, 1 etching, 37 drawings and 8 photographs
Publications: Book with texts by José Manuel Barbeito and Rafael Moneo
VISITOR INFORMATION
Museo Thyssen-Bornemisza
Address: Paseo del Prado, 8. 28014, Madrid. Moneo Galleries, first basement level
Opening times: Tuesdays to Fridays and Sundays, 10am to 7pm; Saturdays, 10am to 9pm
Single ticket: Permanent collection and temporary exhibitions:
- Standard ticket: 12 €
- Reduced price ticket: 8 € for visitors aged over 65, pensioners, students with proof of status and
Large Families
- Free entry: children aged under 12 and officially unemployed Spanish citizens
Advance ticket purchase at the Museum’s ticket desks, from its website and on tel: 91 791 13 70
More information: www.museothyssen.org
Audio guide, available in various languages
PRESS INFORMATION:
http://www.museothyssen.org/microsites/prensa/2017/Moneo/index.html